Samuel Alito Jr.

Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States

Samuel Anthony Alito, Jr., was born in Trenton, New Jersey, April 1, 1950. He married Martha-Ann Bomgardner in 1985, and has two children - Philip and Laura. He served as a law clerk for Leonard I. Garth of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from 1976–1977. He was Assistant U.S. Attorney, District of New Jersey, 1977–1981, Assistant to the Solicitor General, U.S. Department of Justice, 1981–1985, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice, 1985–1987, and U.S. Attorney, District of New Jersey, 1987–1990. He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 1990. President George W. Bush nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat January 31, 2006.

Justice Samuel Alito's forceful dissent in Tuesday's death penalty ruling contains what statistician experts say are at least two mistakes -- one of them having significant bearing on the argument that he and three other colleagues who joined him leveled against the majority.

Judge Shira Scheindlin can take comfort that she's not the only on the bench to be taken to the woodshed.This time, it's her colleague Judge Harold Baer, who also sits in the Southern District of New York, who's come in for reproach.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday unanimously ruled a religious-freedom law permits a Muslim convict to grow a beard, rejecting a claim by Arkansas prison officials that inmates could hide contraband in facial hair.

A religious-freedom law permits a Muslim convict to grow a half-inch beard, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday, dismissing concerns raised by Arkansas prison officials that inmates could hide contraband in facial hair.

Voter identification laws suffered setbacks in two states on Thursday, with the U.S. Supreme Court blocking Wisconsin from imposing its voter-identification measure during the midterm elections and a federal judge in Texas striking down that state’s ID law